Faced with 50m of boundary wall to plant up, many people would have clothed the perimeter with a curtain of climbers above narrow borders. Tuite has taken a different line. He has planted shrubs and small trees against the walls: forsythia, ceanothus, euonymus, viburnum, ornamental pear and the like. “I prune them quite hard to keep them slender and shapely, and clip them to different heights to blur the boundary,” he says. Their density is softened by training climbers through them: Clematis ‘Rouge Cardinal’ is companion to a ceanothus; Clematis ‘Hagley Hybrid’ to a weeping pear. Boundary walls are thus exactly that – walls rather than curtains with a feeling of strength and solidity.

Rather than divide the narrow central strip into a series of rooms – the railway-carriage option – Tuite has taken a more in- formal approach: “I sweep planting areas in from either side to take the eye across the garden rather than down the sides or the middle.” The infill is soft with few straight lines. Paths and borders swirl as if drawn by an artist’s charcoal, and the three main areas of landscaping are separated in ingenious, naturalistic ways, each one different.

The snail-shaped decking near the house is crowded with containers, with specimen trees like Gleditsia ‘Sunburst’, tall lilies and fragrant lavenders helping to conceal the next space – a fish-shaped, brick-edged lawn – with a great feeling of airiness. “In a small garden,” says Tuite, “you don’t want a big canopy. The plants will just get leggy and reach for the light.” So the only intentional focal point, positioned centrally at the lawn’s edge, is a strong young Betula ‘Snowqueen’, a small, elegant tree that also serves to screen the end of the garden from the house and vice-versa.

Beyond the birch lies an area that is wilder in mood. To the left is a frog and newt-filled pond and a stream, turned during this summer of drought into a gravel bed colonised by alchemillas and creeping jenny. To the right is a cool hideaway – a rectangle of decking in front of an old shed painted a powdery blue. Clipped Pittosporum ‘Garnettii’ stand in containers at its base, and other topiary shrubs mark the steps rising to a seating area, backed by foliage and flowers, and warmed by a brazier in the cooler evenings.

These three parts of the garden are reached via a trio of different paths. On one side roof slates have been stacked together as thin setts to make a dark and snaking river, with self-seeded Verbena bonariensis creating an airy summer screen along its length. Against the opposite boundary wall is a weather-beaten walkway made from reclaimed timbers: its rustic fence-cum-handrail is the excuse for yet another natural divider, this time of espaliered apple and pear trees, speckled with clematis, including the large-flowered purple C. ‘Voluceau’. The central pathway has paving blocks set in gravel, and here fountains of grasses and sculpted driftwood provide height and screening.

“I try to make sure that the plants are the major players and that hard landscaping is there for the plants to work with,” says Tuite. There are more than 150 different species and varieties, straying in colour towards the purple side of the spectrum with white as an accent. It takes an age to take them all in and appreciate their many and varied associations. The planting is more traditionally herbaceous in the borders around the lawn and wilder at the fringes. Grasses are favoured everywhere as “they give a whole year’s worth of interest”, and there’s a good sprinkling of trees for autumn colour.

Experimentation, perfectionism and a passion for plants are what drive Tuite. His subtle, complex design offers exciting solutions to the problems facing owners of long and narrow gardens, and although he has chosen to make his garden plant and labour-intensive, the basic concept may be adapted and simplified at will.

Anthony Tuite’s garden is open for parties of five or more by appointment; call 07958 921264

THE TIMES SMALL GARDENS MASTERCLASS

Join Anthony Tuite in his garden at 60 South Croxted Road, SE21, on the afternoon of Sunday, July 23, 2-5pm, to learn about the design, planting and care of a small garden. Tickets cost £15 (15 people maximum). To book, e-mail anthonytuite@fsmail.net.

Design notebook

• In a long, narrow garden, using neutral-coloured decking, paving and gravel focuses attention on the planting.
• Sculpture should work with the garden, not impose on it. Soften statue contours with herbaceous plants or climbers.
• Mirrors can create a useful illusion of space. Mirrored obelisks, although expensive, are architecturally striking and pick up light from different angles.
• Think how natural, especially evening, light moves around the garden, and plant to catch the transient moment.
• With pots and window boxes, consider combining herbaceous perennials (less thirsty and subtler than many annuals) – for example, sedums surrounded by verbenas and petunias.

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